After weeks of struggling amid its explosion in popularity, Helldivers 2 finally increased its server capacity to let more defenders of Democracy join the fight.
Helldivers 2 players rejoice. Server capacity was eventually increased around a fortnight after the game’s release, allowing more players to be online than ever before.
Arrowhead’s CEO himself confirmed the good news on February 22, detailing how, after days of struggle, the developers have “increased server capacity” for Helldivers 2. “Everyone should now be able to pass the login screen,” he assured.
However, despite appearing to be on track, and having apparently increased the cap from the previous authorization of 450,000 concurrent players, Pilestedt confirmed that a new, higher cap is still in place.
“Just to be clear – I mean for now. If everyone logs in, we’ll still hit the ceiling!” So although server capacity has been increased, with the game’s staggering player count still on the rise, you might still run into issues if everyone logs in at the same time.
“We will hit the ceiling again at some point,” the studio CEO quickly followed, confident that the game will surpass its previous peak. “We don’t know if we can support everyone this weekend. We are cautiously increasing the ceiling so as not to have a breakdown.”
It’s safe to say that no one expected the overnight success that Helldivers 2 became. Neither its developers nor those at Sony. The first game’s player count had reached a peak of fewer than 10,000 competitors discovering the 2015 release. Within days, the sequel soared to more than 40 times that figure.
Reaching a peak of over 450,000 concurrent players on PC alone, likely with a few hundred thousand more on PlayStation, Helldivers 2 became a runaway success eclipsing many industry heavyweights in its rise.
As a result of its mega-viral popularity, the servers simply weren’t prepared for the influx of players. Too many people were logging in at the same time, forcing developers to cap the number of competitors at 450,000.
To get around this temporary fallback, players have resorted to leaving their games idle, staying in the AFK space overnight to keep their place on the server. Naturally, the developers cracked down on this tactic in a February 22 update. And now, with the increase in server capacity, this should no longer be a problem.
It remains to be seen what the new server cap might be, or if Helldivers will band together to surpass the peak of 450,000 concurrent players. Rest assured, we will keep you updated with all the latest news.
Leave a Reply